Ok…so what constitutes a “damaged passport”?

the bad news is that some luggage stickers that were stuck onto the back of my data page of my passport (the official observation page) have been torn off

Ive now got three white bits on my official observation page where the passport page has come away with the luggage sticker

(imagine putting a sticker onto a piece of paper then ripping the sticker off, some of the paper will come away with the sticker making it slightly thinner)

my data page on the other side isnt compromised, its just that my official observation page on the reverse of the data page isnt perfect and parts of the page is slightly thinner on the white bits that have come away with the sticker

would you say this is going to cause me trouble? or is it “reasonable wear and tear?”

many thanks if you can help, i dont think i can handle claiming it as damaged but then it would suck big time to be refused entry anywhere

‘What to do about a damaged passport
You do not need to report a damaged passport, but if your passport is damaged beyond reasonable wear and tear, some airlines may not let you travel. For this reason IPS recommends that you apply for a replacement as soon as possible.

You will need to send the damaged passport to IPS when you apply for a replacement. IPS will return it once they have established your identity and confirmed that the damage is not due to fraudulent tampering. ‘Fraudulent tampering’ means someone trying to change the identity details or photo on a passport, for example, to use it illegally.’

Is your data page still completely readable, but just thinner due to the stickers coming off on the outside?

When trying to enter overland to Vietnam, one bloody folded page seemed to constitute a damaged passport but that was fixed with a nice $10, then the passport control official threw the passport on the floor and punched a Japanese tourist in the head for not having the right page of his passport open. Good times.

From what you’ve said, I don’t think you’d have any problems with it. If you phone a call centre, they will always err on the side of caution and tell you it’s not good enough, because if they say it’s fine and then you have problems you’ll blame them. Sounds like a lot of additional stress, cost and trouble just because of a little damage. You could try taking it to a passport or immigration office to look at but then they may also not want to risk you blaming them.

Most airport immigration officials can’t be bothered and if they can be bothered they will just need to take extra steps to ensure it is real and untampered. With the new bimetric passports this should be much easier to verify as they’re much more difficult to fake. It’s probably too late and I can’t see the damage, but I don’t think I would bother doing anything about it.